Ovila Quad - Brandy Barrel Aged
Sierra Nevada Brewing Co.

Think I got this Feb 2013 @ City beer SF
Nice pop of cork, minimal gushing.
Nice dark fruit smell, looks like a quad by color or a rootbeer.
Taste is very subtle brandy easy dark fruit taste tones through the nose.
Medium carbonation, surprisingly. Good mouth feel
Really good, 12/28/2015, Im guessing this beer should be consumed very soon, great beer, think I paid $5 during SF beerweek

 

Pours quite dark from the bottle to the glass, producing a modest dark tan head with good retention for a barrel aged brew.

Aroma is strong and boozy! Loads of dark fruit come through, with massive bready malts, caramel and brown sugar and toffee, and sweet alcohol throughout. All the traditional aromas of some of the best quads are present in abundance, and the barrel adds nuance vice dominance - in fact, other than perhaps a touch of oak dancing around the edges, it's tough to determine just how much the brandy translates to the aroma, beyond a tinge of alcohol.

Flavor immediately hits full strength: it's sweet and surprisingly sour, like overripe fruit - raisins, plums, and prunes come to mind. The brandy also appears, giving it an overall slight burn and a sweetness different than the malt and yeast. The back end features a more subdued, malty sweetness, hints of oak and even tobacco, and thick, bready malts that are hidden in the first half by the slight sourness.

When I say sour, this is still miles away from a true sour beer. That faint sourness - primarily from the barrel, I'm guessing - is still undeniably part of the experience.

Very full bodied, with a mild sting throughout from the alcohol. It's a beer you can definitely chew and savor.

This is a complex and deep beer. I think my only complaint is that for a barrel aged beer, the brandy represents exceptionally mild. That's also a compliment, in that it certainly doesn't overwhelm the base beer, but if the selling point is that this brew is brandy barrel aged, then I'd prefer more of a presence on the palate.

 

 

1/2 growler pour from DeCicco's in Ardsley, NY

dark dark brown/amber, next to no head or lace left on the glass

Toffee, ripe and sweet fruits, chocolate, sherry all come to mind.

Tasty and heady, quality winter night capper kinda brew

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

On draft at the top Gainesville. 9 oz snifter. Listed simply as "Barrel Aged", so I am assuming brandy barreled. Pours dark ruby brown, nearly black in the center. Aroma is what seems to be big whiskey barrel and dark fruits, dry oak, more sweet fruits. Sweet dark fruit, black cherry, grape, vanilla, with some sherry-like notes. Medium heavy mouthfeel with medium carbonation. Good stuff and happy to have found this. It's really a nice beer.

 

 

Had on tap at Burnhearts in Milwaukee.

Pours like any other quad, nice head, looks great.

From there on out, things were a touch down hill. Not sure if this was infected or not, but there were some light-moderate sour fruit notes. They were in competition with the darker, sweeter flavors you would expect in a quad.

Overall, not bad, even if slightly infected.